The Reserve Bank of India has initiated the process of carrying out comprehensive scrutiny covering both head-office and branches of ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank and Axis Bank.
The scrutiny has been initiated following the sting operations conducted by Cobrapost.com, across some branches of these banks, alleging money-laundering and violation of several provisions of the Reserve Bank of India regulations, Foreign Exchange Management Act guidelines, Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), and so on.
The RBI has also undertaken a thematic study in respect of banks that are active in selling gold coins/wealth management products to examine whether there are systemic issues and to plug deficiencies and legal loopholes, if any.
The final reports on all the three banks will be completed by March 31, 2013, the RBI said in a statement.